Mexican drug smugglers may be coming to a neighborhood near you

The meth problem that plagues states in the midwest, south, and west coast states and southeastern states will spread through the northeastern states soon, if Mexican suppliers have their way. According to the DEA, “criminal groups operating from neighboring Mexico smuggle cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, amphetamine, and marijuana into the United States. These criminal groups have smuggled heroin and marijuana across the Southwest Border and distributed them throughout the United States since the 1970s. In addition to distributing cocaine and methamphetamine in the West and Midwest, these Mexico-based groups now are attempting to expand the distribution of those drugs into eastern U.S. markets.

The DEA also reports that meth labs are increasing, despite the fact that products that contain pseudoephrine, like Sudafed, are now kept behind the pharmacy counter as mandated by the “Combat Methamphetamine Epidemic Act of 2005”, that is part of the Patriot Act that was signed in to law by President Bush on March 9, 2006. The DEA is responsible for the enforcement of the Act. They’ve certainly got their work cut out for them. In a DEA report, they stated that “With demand for methamphetamine remaining high, especially in the West and Midwest, so, too, does the number of illicit laboratories that supply methamphetamine to a growing number of addicts. Domestic methamphetamine production, trafficking, and abuse are concentrated in the western, southwestern, and midwestern United States. Methamphetamine is also increasingly available in portions of the South and eastern United States, especially Georgia and Florida. Clandestine laboratories in California and Mexico are the primary sources of supply for methamphetamine available in the United States”